title: Thermodynamic assessment of smectic A-nematic tricritical points through the equal gibbs energy analysis.
abstract: A complete thermodynamic analysis on four two-component phase diagrams between liquid crystals belonging to the nCB and nOCB series of compounds, the so-called cyanobiphenyls, has been performed through the Oonk's equal Gibbs energy method. The binary systems dealt with in this paper show as a common feature the existence of a tricritical point at the SmA-to-N phase transition, all of which reported elsewhere. As a singular finding of the work proposed in this paper, the Oonk's method is extended in order to account for second-order phase transitions. Likewise, this extension allows performing calculations of the tricritical temperature.
authors.affiliation: Laboratori de Caracterització de Materials (LCM-GPFM), Departament de Física i Enginyeria Nuclear, E.T.S.E.I.B Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Diagonal, 647, 08028 Barcelona, Spain. david.orencio.lopez@upc.es
authors.forename: D O
authors.initials: DO
authors.lastname: López
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Cusmin
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Salud
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Diez-Berart
authors.forename: M R
authors.initials: MR
authors.lastname: de la Fuente
authors.forename: M A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Pérez-Jubindo